7 in 10 bottles failing to show safe drink limits

NEARLY three quarters of alcohol bottles or cans are not displaying the Government’s safe drinking limits four years after they were announced, an investigation has found.

This included one in four that were showing the wrong, potentially harmful advice and claiming men could have up to 28 units a week and women up to 21 units a week.

The Government overhauled its drinking guidelines in January 2016 and recommended both men and women should have no more than 14 units a week.

This is equivalent to about four and a half pints of beer, four and a half glasses of wine or 14 single shots of spirits.

But the Alcohol Health Alliance – a coalition of 50 organisations including the Royal College of Physicians and Cancer Research UK – found this was absent from 71 per cent of beverages.

It found 24 per cent of bottles or cans contained the wrong, out-ofdate advice, which says women can have two to three units a day, or 21 a week, and men three to four units daily, or 28 units a week.

Forty-seven per cent did not have any advice at all. Only 29 per cent had the up-to-date 14 units limit.

The investigation looked at 424 types of wine, beer and spirits and is the largest so far to assess manufacturers’ compliance with the new guidelines. The limits were slashed in 2016 by the then chief medical officer Dame Sally Davies over concerns that even moderate levels of alcohol may substantially increase the risk of cancer, heart disease and strokes.

But there was no legally-binding obligation on the drinks industry to display them on their products and experts believe manufacturers are simply ignoring them.

Professor Sir Ian Gilmore, chairman of the Alcohol Health Alliance, said: ‘The alcohol industry has been dragging its heels for four years in updating product labelling to display current drinking guidelines.

‘It is simply outrageous that the vast majority of products still fail to include up-to-date guidelines.

‘The message is clear: the alcohol industry is not taking the nation’s health seriously and cannot be trusted to regulate itself.’

The drinks industry was given a final deadline for changing its labels in September 2019 by the Food Standards Agency. And the Portman Group, which represents leading drinks firms, promised their products would carry the new guidelines from July 2019.

John Timothy, of the Portman Group, said: ‘ We encourage all producers to include the [updated] guidance. Consumers will see [it] appear on more products later this year, as existing stock is exhausted.’

The Department of Health said: ‘We have been clear that the alcohol industry must reflect the guidelines. [We] will continue to work closely with industry partners and monitor progress.’